Curfew Under Management

7

Dedicated to Elisa for having written an amazing book called Disses to Kisses. (it's deleted tho)

CHAPTER 7

12:?? AM

"You go first." Dexter innocently suggests beside me.

Despite the fact that I've never played 21 questions before, my conscience has gladly armed me with a number of questions that I've been dying to ask, questions like why didn't he ever tell his parents about this, why did he have a suitcase filled with clothes in his room, was he running away, why did he plan to run away and last but not the least, why was he being so calmly secretive about all of this. The thought of it frustrates me.

"When was the last time you wet your bed?" Out of unmonitored pressure, different words escape my mouth. Although, I've honestly always wanted to ask someone that just for the fun of it.

Instead of answering, he bursts hysterically into the funniest laugh I've ever heard him do yet.

A particular characteristic that has got me dazed everytime something funny comes up ever since we met is that Dexter Conroy is plagued with a laugh way funnier than any joke stand-up comedians could formulate. I've heard a lot of funny laughs in my lifetime, but Dexter's, well, it's just something else.

"Y--you--" He chuckles. "You'd--" His prized laugh doubles louder, and I practically do a head bang, laughing my ass off as well. If we aren't tied up to such unescapable metal bars, I could've been rolling on the cement by now.

"What?" I ask him, still engrossed in laughter.

"You'd waste a turn with that?" Dexter supresses from snickering again. Gasping for air, my head involuntarily leans on his shoulder. Suprisingly, it doesn't feel like I'm invading his space at all. We've been sitting here next to each other for quite some time now, and I doubt if I got used to it way faster than he did.

"Oh, I don't think I wasted it. You have to admit. You're laugh is way funnier than the question." I tell him catching my breath.

"I get that a lot." He shrugs giving me one last chuckle. "But that question though was a first."

"Just answer it." I roll my eyes.

"Okay, okay. I was--" His face thought of an answer for a few seconds and smiled. "Eight."

9:21 PM

"Okay, what the fuck just happened?" According to the gossip that got me called off during trigonometry, Dylan is the only student in our school who took initiative in learning the talent of manufacturing fake ID's for his fellow minors. They said he used the skill to trick his ex-girlfriend and her new boyfriend into getting caught at a local club chugging down booze and getting stoned, but I found it in me to disagree.

"I told you he was crazy." I shrug to my defense.

"Yeah, but I didn't think he was homicidal crazy!" Dylan Samuels couldn't have had the heart to set anyone up like that, 'cause back in Kendra's house, I swear for five seconds, that guy turned into a scared puppy.

9:02 PM

"I don't know if I can go with you inside." Recently-dressed in a sweatshirt, Dylan lands a pair of traumatized eyes on Kendra who is now sleeping in the back of his four-seated truck. We are parked out side a three-story house that has a handful of balconies, garden gnomes and a huge outdoor grill, otherwise known as the home of celebrity chef, Melvin Dodds, Kendra's dad, Kendra's scary dad.

We dropped Bailey by her apartment which, by the way, is still a lot to take in even though I've been there so many times. Her older sister, Caroline, always rearranges the furniture and puts up varied wallpapers every other month. She's an apartment broker, the kind who remodels apartments into lifestyle network showrooms to get people to move in without questioning if the past tenant died in there. I figure Brooklyn needed such people.